Big data: It’s changing the whole way humans will solve problems

Current “big data” and “API-ification” trends can trace their roots to a definition Kant first coined in the 18th century. In his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant drew a dichotomy between analytic and synthetic truths.

An analytic truth was one that could be derived from a logical argument, given an underlying model or axiomatization of the objects the statement referred to. Given the rules of arithmetic we can say “2+2=4” without putting two of something next to two of something else and counting a total of four.

A synthetic truth, on the other hand, was a statement whose correctness could not be determined without access to empirical evidence or external data. Without empirical data, I can’t reason that adding five inbound links to my webpage will increase the number of unique visitors 32%.